Loanwords:

"Why do we use words that aren't ours"

1. Loanwords (Definition, maybe examples)

2. When does a foreign word become a loanword?

3. When did loanwords enter the English language? (perhaps OED statistics?)

4. Why did loanwords enter the English language? (Palmer 2009, Burrow & Turville
Petre 1996, Tristram) -> maybe examples of certain words to underline their
importance in daily life

Strange inkhorn terms:

are loanwords a threat?
(History, Syntax) Are loanwords a good thing or a bad thing?

• How do contemporary writers evaluate the massive borrowing of foreign words during the
Early Modern period? How do people evaluate loanwords today?

• Did English suffer from the massive borrowing of words in Medieval and Early Modern
times, judging in retrospect?

• Were the loanwords necessary at the time? What functions did they have (semantic,
stylistic, ...)?

In which kinds of texts (translations or not? scientific or narrative? dictionary or else?) do

they first occur? (Ask the OED.) Consult the HTE on your favourite loan word and its
synonyms (try explain if you aren't feeling creative).

Are there differences in meaning between the new words and the older ones that may have
made borrowing necessary?

Did the loanwords fill lexical gaps? data: OED and HTE data (collect yourselves!) lit: Fennell
2000 [1992]; Graddol et al. 1996: ch. 4
CLAUDIA: How does a foreign language word becomes a loanword?

What It's a loanword?

Loanwords are words that speakers of one language borrow from speakers of another
language. A borrowing is another name for a loanword. The process through which speakers
incorporate words into their native tongue from a source language is referred to as abstract
noun borrowing. The moment in which these words became borrowings is when a speech
community that does not speak the language in which they were first used starts to use them
in their own language.

How does this happen?

The cultural contact between two different language populations leads to borrowing as a
consequence of the constant interaction. Although word borrowing is possible between the
two contact languages in both directions, there is frequently an asymmetry that favours one
direction over the other. This occurs because the language where words are being borrowed
belongs to a community that might have some edge in terms of strength, notoriety, and/or
income that makes the things and concepts it contributes desirable and helpful to the
borrowing language community. For instance, the Germanic tribes acquired many loanwords
from Latin in the first several centuries AD when they acquired new goods through trade with
the Romans. On the other hand, few Germanic words made it into Latin. When using the
borrowing words, individuals use the new word as it matches the concept they are
attempting to convey.

https://www.ruf.rice.edu/~kemmer/Words04/structure/borrowed.html
· Borrowed Words. (s. f.).

(Borrowed Words, s. f.)

virginia We refer to the concept of ‘’loan word’’when there is the need to refer to a

concept or an object that does not have a real name in the target language .

the lexical loan therefore has the function of filling a linguistic gap, they are of a relevant

importance because they give many others way to communicate and they make also a

language easier to understand and also not less important they help in enriching, expanding

and developing the language and to discover new words that we didn’t know before .

Giada: Why did Loanwords enter the English language?

Language contact refers to the frequent communication between different languages and
the results it produces. The main causes of language contact are war conquest, trade,
cultural exchange and immigration. The three languages with the most influence on
modern English are Latin, French, and German.

1) Loanwords from Greek:

The ancient Greeks made major contributions to areas such as philosophy, mathematics,
science, and medicine. During the Renaissance, knowledge of Greek was rediscovered in
Europe and it became a major influence on the development of Western culture and
thought. Many Greek words and ideas were adopted into the English language to describe
new concepts and discoveries. Additionally, as the British Empire expanded, it came into
contact with Greek-speaking communities and their cultures, leading to further exchange of
words and ideas.

anonymous - ‘anōnumos’.

2) Loanwords from Latin:

There are words in English that come from the Latin language because Latin was the
language of the Roman Empire. Latin was also the language of the Catholic Church, which
held significant power and influence during the Middle Ages. Latin words were introduced
into the English language through a variety of means, including religious texts, scientific
and medical terminology, and legal language. Latin was also the root of many Romance
languages, such as French and Spanish, and as English came into contact with these
languages through conquest, trade, and cultural exchange, Latin loanwords were
introduced into English. To this day, many academic and scientific disciplines continue to
use Latin-based terminology.

ceaster 'city'
circul 'circle'
maegester 'master'

3) Loanwords from German:

During the medieval period, England and Germany had close trade and cultural ties, which
led to the borrowing of German words into English, particularly in the areas of law,
commerce, and music.
English is a Germanic language, so it shares similarities with German and other languages
in the Indo-European language family.

● Noodle - from German 'nudel'

● Abseil - from German ‘abseilen’
● Delicatessen - from German ‘delikatessen’

4) Loanwords from French

From 450 AD to 1066 AD, the Normans conquered and occupied Britain. Therefore, the
British aristocracy worshiped the French and liked to learn the language. The upper classes
of British society were proud of speaking French.

Allowance – alouance

Solicitor – soliciteur

5) Loanwords from Italian

During the Renaissance, Italy was a center of artistic, intellectual, and commercial activity,
and many Italian words related to these fields were adopted into the English language.
This influence can be seen in areas such as music, architecture, fashion, and cuisine.

novel- novella
umbrella- ombrello
concert -concerto

6) Loanwords from Spanish

Hispanic immigrants have exerted a certain influence on the politics, economy and culture
of American society, and a large number of Hispanic words enter American English.

Breeze- brisa
Ranch- rancho
Cockroach- Cucaracha

Sources
Schultz, J. (2012). Twentieth-century borrowings from French into English – an overview: On
the continuing influence of French on the English lexicon. English Today, 28(2), 3-9.
doi:10.1017/S0266078412000089

Kemmer, S. (n.d.). Loanwords. Words in English: Loanwords. Retrieved February 1, 2023,

from https://www.ruf.rice.edu/~kemmer/Words/loanwords.html
Cudoo. (2016, December 15). Something Borrowed - English Words with Foreign Origins.
Cudoo Blog. https://cudoo.com/blog/something-borrowed-english-words-with-foreign-origins/

Why did loanwords enter the English language?

Philip Durkin, Borrowed Words: A History of Loanwords in English

p.53

For centuries the Celts were among their most important neighbors in north-west Europe.
This situation probably gave rise to some very early loanwords (e.g. one reflected by modern
English rich and modern German Reich ‚kingdom‘: see section 4.2).

p.54

The resulting geographical proximity meant that Romans and Germani were often in conflict,
but also had extensive cultural exchange.

p.56

Administration and much economic life was centered on Roman military installations, cities,
and towns; agricultural production appears largely to have fallen under the control of these
units, and/or of Romano-British villas, or of villages or other small settlements which appear
to have differed from the towns largely in their administration and (generally) in their size.

p.60

It is quite possible that the emergent Anglo-Saxon kingdoms absorbed many Britons, who
decided that an Anglo-Saxon identity spelled future success and who consequently adopted
English, the language of the conquerors.

pp.64

It is pretty certain that some Scandinavian was in use in some communities in Britain in the
eleventh century, and possibly in places even in the twelfth century.

p.65

In the immediate post-Conquest period, there were native speakers of French as well as of
English, Scandinavian languages, and Celtic languages forming part of the population of
Britain. Long after the period in which it was anyone’s first language in Britain, French
remained important, like Latin, as a language used in various technical functions as part of
many people’s everyday lives.

Borrowings from Celtic (pp.77)

Brock ‘badger’
Bin ‘manger’
Coomb ‘valley’
luh ‘lake’
torr ‘rock’
funta ‘fountain’
Pen ‘hill’
Coble ‘type of flat-bottomed rowing boat’
becca ‘fork’
bratt ‘cloak’
gafeluc ‘spear’
assa ‘ass’

pen - first recorded usage in ~1140

hill (hyll) - first recorded usage in ~1150
ADD this diagram to the poster:
3
Diagram of the contribution of other languages to English language

https://www.englishlanguagefaqs.com/2013/07/what-are-loanwords.html

https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TEfgND-opoo/YJpZunVY8sI/AAAAAAAACeI/WaMLVXoCBRUCu
L84kSK1qwlJsPcnl3lEwCLcBGAsYHQ/s1080/IMG_20210511_153945.webp
In Middle English, there was a period of massive lexical borrowing in English which has been
taking place ever since.

To add into the introduction of the script:

The Norman invasion of 1066 prompted a massive influx of French loanwords into Middle
English. At this point, lexical borrowing became a key feature of the English language and
still is today. It has been estimated that three quarters of the words in the English Language
come from borrowings from other languages, particularly French and Latin.

(Janne Skaffari. “Studies in Early Middle English Loanwords: Norse and French Influences.”
Neuphilologische Mitteilungen, vol. 111, no. 2, 2010, pp. 249–51.)
To add into the paragraph about Latin in the script:

Part of the reason for the extensive number of Latin loanwords in English – particularly in
fields such as medicine – is prestige. Latin was considered to be a more sophisticated
language than English, since for centuries it had been the only language used by the
Church, scientists and scholars in England (as well as elsewhere in Europe). However, the
massive influx of Latin loanwords met some dispute, as some believed that an excessive
amount of Latin words were being used in English writing, to the point where it was difficult
to understand for the average English speaker. This is known as the Inkhorn Controversy.
These ‘inkhorn terms’ or ‘inkhornisms’ came to be viewed as unnecessary and pretentious,
and many either never made it into the English vocabulary, or have come out of usage in
modern English.

Despite this, an abundance of Latin loanwords still make up a great part of English
vocabulary, particularly in certain fields such as the language of medicine.

What could be added onto the poster:

A bar chart to show when Latin words entered English (OED, 2022):

As we can see in this bar chart, the use of Latin loanwords in the English Language peaked
in the Early Modern period. This coincides with the Age of Anxiety - a time in which English
started to be used in science and literature, after the introduction of Caxton’s Printing
Press. Many Latin words were used because they were considered to sound more
‘scientific’, ‘intelligent’ or ‘elegant’ than their English counterparts. Between the years 1600
and 1649, 7251 Latin loanwords were introduced to the English language, for example:
additive, adjacency, cannula and capillary. Many Latin borrowings are used in the field of
medicine. The OED lists 7476 entries for words from Latin in medicine, such as ‘abdominal’,
first recorded in the year 1590, borrowed from the Latin abdominalis.

(OED, 2022, https://www.oed.com/timelines)

(OED, 2022,
https://www.oed.com/search?browseType=sortAlpha&case-insensitive=true&langClass=La
tin&nearDistance=1&ordered=false&pageSize=20&scope=SENSE&sort=entry&subjectClass=
Medicine&type=dictionarysearch)

Cut out from poster:

• Fills linguistic gap
• Makes language easier to understand
• Enriches and expands a language
• Helps to further develop / evolve a language
• Makes language users discover new words / concepts

The cultural contact between two different language populations leads to

borrowing as a consequence of the constant interaction. For instance, the
Germanic tribes acquired many loanwords from Latin in the first several
centuries AD when they acquired new goods through trade with the Romans.
On the other hand, few Germanic words made it into Latin. When using the
borrowing words, individuals use the new word as it matches the concept
they are attempting to convey.